Selasa, 06 Desember 2011

Tokyo Show 2011 Highlights: 2013 Subaru BRZ

The Subaru BRZ production car has been officially unveiled at the Tokyo motor show, and the man behind the sports coupé has promised that it will offer "pure driving pleasure".

Toshio Masuda, Subaru product planning senior general manager, who led the development of the BRZ, has spoken about the challenges of creating the joint project with Toyota.

Masuda said: “The car you see here will make it to Europe with no changes. We’ve always had all-wheel drive and a turbo, so this is a new brand image for us. The packaging of the car is ideal to show off the best of the boxer engine."

According to the Masuda, the Subaru BRZ will remain in production for a long time in various guises: “Subaru is a sports brand. We first want to show you the base for BRZ and it will have a long life cycle and will consider future derivatives. There will be no turbo though.

“When you drive the car you will be surprised at just how good the handling and steering feel is.”

The BRZ is mechanically identical to the Toyota GT 86, which was revealed earlier this week, but has different body work and a different, more stripped down interior.

The BRZ is 4240mm long, 1775 mm wide and 1300 mm) high. The ‘boxer’ engine in the BRZ has been installed as low as possible, enabling the car to feature a low hood and sleek roofline. The hexagonal lower front grille, hawk eye headlights and fin-shaped fog lamps are designed to evoke other cars in the Subaru family.

Subaru UK has also recently confirmed that the BRZ - short for Boxer, engine, Rear-drive, Zenith - will come to the UK next spring, although the adverse exchange rate of the Yen versus the Pound is forecast to keep prices high and limit sales to around 500 cars a year in the UK.